Millimeter-Wave Wirelessly-Powered Phased-Array Relay Transceiver Utilizing CMOS Switching Rectifier-Type Mixer

Abstract

This paper presents a CMOS full-wave switching rectifier capable of mixer operation. The proposed CMOS switching rectifier allows DC power generation and frequency conversion without a power supply. The proposed CMOS switching rectifier using a center-tapped balun produces DC power with 40.7 % efficiency, while at the same time providing frequency up-conversion with -16.4 dB and down-conversion with -10.8 dB. The size of the chip is 0.286mm², and four chips are mounted on the phased-array antenna board. The board can be used as a wirelessly powered relay transceiver, and the relay transceiver can be driven without an external power supply. In TX mode, the beamwidth is narrower than that of a common phased array transceiver, but it is capable of beam steering from -45 to 45 degrees. On the other hand, in RX mode, the wide beamwidth allows the proposed relay transceiver to receive from a wide range without changing the phase shifter settings. The measured EVM values are -27.4dB for TX mode and -27.5dB for RX mode with a 400-MHz 64QAM OFDMA-mode signal (5G NR, MCS 17).